


thousand

by spacebutterfly



Category: Inazuma Eleven GO, Inazuma Eleven GO Chrono Stone
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-12
Updated: 2013-11-12
Packaged: 2018-01-01 05:55:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 695
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1041132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spacebutterfly/pseuds/spacebutterfly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After Chrono Storm disbands, Fei doesn't suddenly get the happy ending he wished for. It's more complicated than that.</p>
            </blockquote>





	thousand

It's cold.

The wind whistles past silver skyscrapers, under the bottom of busy cars, pierces the balcony and makes an icy cut on his skin. Slipping its way inside, it chills the inside of the heart. It's not a feeling of sadness it brings with it, more like emptiness. The frost steals away the heat inside and stops anything from growing.

Maybe that's a better way for Fei to describe how he's been feeling up til now – or rather, how the world seems to appear in his eyes – like the planet's axis has screeched to a halt, and the daily bustle of human life is only for show, and nothing really happens, and time never really passes.

Fei reaches out to catch a snowflake in his hands, but it melts before even touching his palm. He doesn't have time to see its pattern before it disappears.

His father will be finished with work soon, given the hour, and soon he'll return and fill the house with his own empty soul, and the two of them will eat dinner together and stiffly smile and talk about school, the weather, the news...

Fei leans over the edge of the balcony, staring at the quiet, hazy street below. Soon it will be full of people on their way home from work. Just like every day.

“Tenma...” Fei murmurs, lifting his gaze to the cloudy sky. When he thinks of Tenma – and not just Tenma, but all his other friends too – he feels like he's on the edge of remembering how it feels to be warm inside, how it feels for the world to be bright and bursting with colour. He had known that world once, if only for little more than an hour...

There's a faint knock from inside the apartment. Grounded in reality, Fei slips through the sliding doors to inside, through the grey rooms of the house to the front door.

On the other side, people are talking. One of them must be his father, of course.

“...Just a second. I'm sure he's in...Fei!” His father knocks on the door again, more loudly this time.  
“I'm coming!” says the boy quickly, grabbing the key from the nearby shelf and unlocking the door to his parent and his guest.

Fei's eyes meet piercing blues and an expression of practised innocence.

“Saru,” he murmurs, glancing from his old friend to his father and back again. “What are you doing here?” The white-haired boy tilts his head.

“Aren't you happy to see me?” he asks, in a voice deadly reminiscent of his old ways. Then, more sheepishly, he adds, “Actually, I ran into your father on the way home, and...well...”

“He asked if you'd like to play soccer with the other Seco- the other children.” Asurei gives Fei a knowing look. “Not a bad idea, I think.”

“Soccer...” murmurs Fei, with the faintest of smiles. It's not like it's anything new. It's not like Fei has ever forgotten about soccer, and yet... “Maybe...maybe I should...”

“I think that's the best thing for you right now,” says his father. “It's been too long since you've seen them.”

“Everyone's been asking for you,” says Saru, laughing a little. “Everyone wants to see you again.” Fei stares at his feet and nods.

“I'm sorry. Lately I just feel like running away.” It's the simplest way he can put it.

“I understand.” Fei looks up. At a second glance, he thinks that maybe he can sense some of the same weariness in his old friend's eyes. Like he's suffering the same chill.

“Saru,” says Fei seriously, with the ghost of a smirk, “I won't go easy on you.” Saru nods.

“Well, I won't lose.”

“Just don't catch cold, either of you,” says Asurei with a warning smile.

 

Nothing gets better by magic. The gaps in his heart will remain for many months, maybe many years. It could be that he'll always be a boy with an air of sadness about him. But even in a sad, grey world, one can make bright and colourful memories that become the fuel for living each day.

Fei knows, because he isn't alone anymore.


End file.
